Peanut butter

Ok, so peanut butter is something we use a LOT of at our house, and natural or organic PB is SO expensive! One of my beauties can't have corn syrup, and I've been really trying to cut out all overly processed sweeteners for the rest of us too! Although, my hubby and I STILL can't give up our organic evaporated cane sugar for our coffee yet! 

So... What to do? Continue to pay over $5 for a jar of organic PB(which still has sugar in it) when we go through 4 jars a month bare minimum, find it in bulk, OR make my own.  We recently aquired a BJ's wholesale membership(a whole other post that needs to be made!) so I looked there for "safe" PB. No luck. But what they DID have was this giant bag of unsalted roasted peanuts, still in the shell!  I think I payed $4 for this 5lb bag!

I know, I know, not organic, but really, I'm more concerned with the sugars in my PB anyway! So, here's what you need...

A really good blender(or one you don't mind burning the motor out in!) or food processor

Peanuts-about 2&1/2 lbs before you de-shell them. This gave us about 5 cups after the shells were off. I've heard that blanched ones work good for PB too, but since this is my only experience, I can't say for sure!

Grapeseed, coconut, or olive oil-I think I ended up using about 2 TBS

Maple syrup or honey (if you like your PB sweet)- I think I used 2-4 TBS

Sea salt-I probably used about a teaspoon

First, if you bought the ones that are still in the shell you have to de-shell and de-skin them. The roasted ones are super easy to get the skins off! The kids loved helping me with this, and my littlest man(almost 4) did a super good job at this!

My littlest lady (almost 2) also helped, but she ate all the peanuts she de-shelled! Anyway, after you get them all ready, toss them in your blender or food processor and grind away! You'll need to stop often to scrape down the sides, and to prevent your blender or food processor from over heating! You can add a bit of oil if your machine is really struggling. Once it's smooth and moving in your machine like a thick liquid like substance, you can add in your sweetener and salt. This is really to taste, but I did notice that as the PB cooled it actually turned out sweeter than I thought  it was! Then, just pour your PB into a container of your choice! I store mine in the fridge because I DETEST stirring PB, and this will separate! I used an old pasta sauce jar! I got about 25 oz of PB from this! :)